Dr. Emily Porter, sister of Rep. Katie Porter (D-CA), is warning about the dangers of still contracting Covid-19 even though you’ve received the first of two vaccination shots:
We didn’t let our guard down, but I’m not gonna lie—COVID in our household the week after we both got vaccinated is a major buzzkill. https://t.co/aXp4FwRRBd
— Emily Porter, M.D. (@dremilyportermd) December 27, 2020
In this instance it was Dr. Porter’s husband, an ER doctor, who started feeling sick on Christmas day after receiving his vaccine shot:
Updates from the last 48 hours: (Thread)
12/25: My ER attending physician husband got his first fever of 2020. On Christmas. After avoiding COVID since March. 9 days after his COVID vaccine. I don’t know whether to scream or cry. 1/10
— Emily Porter, M.D. (@dremilyportermd) December 27, 2020
And then he tested positive for Covid-19:
12/26: And…that’s a positive rapid COVID PCR for him. The rest of us are pending testing Monday and Tuesday.
We are so thankful we did not gather w/ family or attend Christmas Eve mass because he developed symptoms AFTER he’d have exposed others. 2/10
— Emily Porter, M.D. (@dremilyportermd) December 27, 2020
To be clear, the vaccine didn’t have time to work before he tested positive. This is not a vaccine failure. It is just incredibly unlucky timing. We were hoping our household could make it through unscathed after all we’ve sacrificed and how careful we’ve been. 3/10
— Emily Porter, M.D. (@dremilyportermd) December 27, 2020
He moved out for 3.5 months April-July and we’ve both been vaccinated as we’re both physicians. So close!!! We also did not travel/gather for Thanksgiving. Or eat indoors. Or have a service for my grandma when she passed of COVID 12/14. 4/10
— Emily Porter, M.D. (@dremilyportermd) December 27, 2020
Either we were exposed at work or possibly one of our children at school/preschool. We will be fine—I hope. But I’m so ready for the high risk people to get vaccinated. 5/10
My 8 yo is hyperventilating & hysterical.
— Emily Porter, M.D. (@dremilyportermd) December 27, 2020
She’s afraid her parents are going to die like my grandma, wants to know if she’ll have to move to Cali/Philly and leave all her friends, blaming her brother for giving it to Dad as he had a runny nose and a single fever 9 days ago. 6/10
— Emily Porter, M.D. (@dremilyportermd) December 27, 2020
She even burst into tears tonight for “lying to me.” The “lie”? That she threw her Motrin in the trash last night instead of taking it for her 101.4 fever and now she’s afraid she’s going to die, too. And Ryan’s job wants to know when he’ll be back. 7/10
— Emily Porter, M.D. (@dremilyportermd) December 27, 2020
He is supposed to work 12/27, 1/1, 1/2, 1/3, 1/4, 1/5 and 1/6. He doesn’t have paid vacation days so he’ll have to pay back any missed shifts so of course he wants to return ASAP while I hear him hacking through a closed door. 8/10
— Emily Porter, M.D. (@dremilyportermd) December 27, 2020
He also doesn’t want to dump on his coworkers. Healthcare workers are not okay. We are NOT okay. We get scared just like everyone else. And we’ve seen enough people die to know how unpleasant it is, even in the best of circumstances. 9/10
— Emily Porter, M.D. (@dremilyportermd) December 27, 2020
So, before you gather for New Year’s, Monica’s birthday, chowing down on Mexican food indoors or whatever you may be doing, remember that your actions have consequences and there might not be a doctor left to take care of you if you get sick because WE ARE NOT OKAY. 10/10
— Emily Porter, M.D. (@dremilyportermd) December 27, 2020
Her family is now in quarantine and awaiting the results of their own tests:
I wish @dominos had a “subscribe & save” feature like Amazon because I’m gonna need 2 medium cheese pizzas, cinnamon twists, parmesan bread bites and a 2L of Diet Coke at least 4X per weeks x 14 days to feed this family of 6 while we recover from COVID.
— Emily Porter, M.D. (@dremilyportermd) December 27, 2020
It’s also gotten political for Dr. Porter:
24 hr later, we’re still waiting on the helicopter to land in our front lawn to take my frontline physician husband to get his free lifesaving monoclonal antibodies. I just assumed that it happened automatically for every American with COVID, or were we supposed to call someone?
— Emily Porter, M.D. (@dremilyportermd) December 27, 2020
But, there’s actually some good news here. Those experimental treatments that the president and others close to him received *are* available to the general public *right now* and are going unsued in many parts of the country. From the NYT:
When antibody treatments first got authorized for emergency use last month, everyone thought they’d get snatched up. But that hasn’t happened. @RebeccaDRobbins and I called hospitals around the country to figure out what was going on. https://t.co/9iTwz4OSJX
— Katie Thomas (@katie_thomas) December 23, 2020
We found a wide variety in how hospitals have embraced these treatments. At Tufts Medical Center in Boston, out of 117 doses received, only 19 patients have gotten infused. But at Huntsville Hospital in Alabama, doctors are turning patients away.
— Katie Thomas (@katie_thomas) December 23, 2020
Some of the reasons are no surprise: continued lags and confusion over testing is making it hard to identify the right patients. Hospitals are overwhelmed with rising cases and vaccine rollouts.
— Katie Thomas (@katie_thomas) December 23, 2020
Eli Lilly’s chief scientific officer, Dr. Daniel Skovronsky, offered another theory: with politicians bragging about getting the treatment, ordinary people didn’t even ask for them. “People thought, well it’s not for me — it’s for those people.”
— Katie Thomas (@katie_thomas) December 23, 2020
***
